No lasers or grenade launchers yet but at least I finally got a little time clear to get this little platform working in a predictable way, with the controller managing DC motors rather than servos or steppers. Truthfully I'm not at all sure that something so typically mechanical is part of my goal. I'm now thinking about using flexible kevlar strips to push bits around, like twistable tendons on a flexible stalk. Motorized rubber bands?

My real interest in this is trying to get at the idea that embodiment, input, and and output are all the same. When someone turns to look at you, not only does that change their collection of immediate stimuli, but the way that they look also has an expressive effect that's transmitted. Should the sound and speed of a motor be considered an expressive part of a robot's presence (how else would people sell Harley Davidsons?)? The idea of separable inputs and outputs, as we have in formal systems like computers, seems to me to be an artificial construct, unlike the nature of being in the world.